


Saintsfall

by Ataraxian



Category: The Grisha Trilogy - Leigh Bardugo
Genre: (or is he), Do Not Try Me, F/M, General!Alina, I React Badly To Flaming, NO DARKLING YET, Orphan!Darkling, Orphans Everywhere, archie is cute tho, drabbles only no thinking, gonna try very hard not to make this gay as hell, hmm.... many wonderings, how do fanfics, i hate mal sry, if you're lucky maybe you'll see him, let me know? i guess?, no anyone yet really, no idea if this will earn the rating yet but uhh War Is Bad Folks, or maybe i shouldn't try, this is a prequel to a series i'm trying to decide if i even want to write
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-17
Updated: 2020-06-17
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:34:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24766255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ataraxian/pseuds/Ataraxian
Summary: This is Ravka. There is the Fold. The Darkling hasn't been seen in years, when a Grisha examiner discovers the Sunsaint in an orphanage.(Or: once the sun has risen, all that's left is the setting.)
Relationships: Genya Safin & Alina Starkov, Ivan & Alina Starkov, Nikolai Lantsov/Alina Starkov, The Darkling | Aleksander Morozova/Alina Starkov, Zoya Nazyalensky & Alina Starkov
Comments: 17
Kudos: 23





	Saintsfall

**Author's Note:**

> I do not consider myself A Fanfic Writer but a dear friend has asked me to beta her fic and you know what IT INSPIRED ME so here we are I guess and I guess I'm A Fanfic Writer now. Check out orphan of broken dreams by hollandswife and uhh also this I guess!

_With nimble fingers and slim wrists she weaves a song, and the roaring wind is her melody._

——- 

You know how the story goes. Boy meets girl, boy pulls girl’s hair, they are friends forever, until the Grisha Examiners come.

You know how the story goes.

_Or do you?_

——- 

It is the sacred duty of the Grisha Examiners to pick every Grisha, and more importantly, to find _the one_.

The one who will bend the shadows to their will, like the previous Darkling. But the previous Darkling hadn’t been seen in decades; the previous Darkling had disappeared, Shadow Fold unchanged, to leave Ravka to its own ruin.

What they find is not a Darkling, but a girl. Small and mousy and barely anything to look at, but the amplifiers are not denied; she has the touch of the Small Science, and when tested, she sparks light from her palms.

 _Light_. A beautiful word. On her lips it is a question. On the lips of the Examiners, of the Grisha— 

—it sounds more like _salvation_.

——- 

As a Sun Summoner, she is somewhat disappointing; it takes her two years to learn how to call her light, and she never manages to do it _too_ impressively. But the Second Army must have a leader, and in place of a Darkling, there is no one else left to lead.

One does not simply spring up from the ground a fully-formed general, though; every Grisha requires training, then the crown requires their service. In service is where Alina will have the chance to prove she is worth it: otherwise, the Second Army will inevitably founder, eventually perish. 

If nothing else, Alina thinks, she resolves to prevent this entirely. 

——- 

_Sunsaint_ , they call her, and behind the backs of the royal family, they call her _Sol Koroleva_. 

Sun Queen.

It is tongue-in-cheek: the Second Army decided long ago that it was only a matter of time before they were able to declare a Grisha queen; their Sankta, their _Alina_ , she was too good to be anything but. Alina is beautiful, but not vain. Alina is a leader, but not unable to follow. 

She’s smart, quietly so, so smart that it doesn’t hit you until the precise moment she desires it to; and moreover, she was raised _next to_ Nikolai, the Lantsov prince. Not close enough to be siblings, but more preferentially treated than any Grisha had a right to be; more courtly than any Grisha had a right to be; and what other reason is there for this than to ultimately declare her his queen?

Both Commander Starkov and Prince Nikolai deny this. They are _friends_ , they insist. They are _comrades_ , they insist. 

(But Genya Safin sees the look in his eyes when Alina turns away from him: and she knows, even if he doesn’t, even if _Alina_ doesn’t, what the future holds for them down this road they insist they are not walking.)

——- 

She enrolls in the Second Army the same day she graduates, as do all Grisha. It is the pride of their people, to serve the country, to defeat the Unsea. Tirelessly, for generations untold, Ravkan Grisha have been trying to heal the Shadow Fold. Tirelessly, for slightly _fewer_ generations untold, they did so with the help of a leader.

Without the Darkling, Second Army leadership consists of a council of the most senior members. As Ravkans go they’re all grumpy and annoyed, and ready to cede the problems of the Army to Ensign Starkov almost on day one. 

It is the Tidemaker Commander who calls for patience, for sincerity of thought. It is the Inferni Commander who agrees, and a mostly-fraught tribunal later, Ensign Starkov is brought in to listen to council meetings as the official Second Army scribe. 

As she makes battle maps and draws up strategy plans, Alina gets a good look at what it takes to run an army, to win a war, to determine the value of every life you command—and do the heart-wrenching math to accommodate it.

In the Second Army, she makes friends. Ivan the Heartrender, Zoya the Squaller, Genya the Tailor, David the Durast; she makes enemies, too, but no one will admit to being an enemy of the woman practically earmarked to become the _de facto_ leader of the Second Army. 

She’s not much to look at, Zoya had said to her once, but what she’d meant was _don’t let people underestimate you_.

And on the day she becomes _General_ Starkov instead of _Commander_ Starkov, Alina no longer remembers what she’d ever been missing.

——- 

With nimble fingers and slim wrists she weaves a song, and the roaring wind is her melody. 

Only, here there is no wind but what the Squallers can call, and the roar is dull, at first—amelodic. The volcra rise to meet it, swarming in the unnatural night.

Like a beam she is there, _the General_ —one hand splayed above her head, the other pressed delicately to her lips. Golden light sears in the black of it, and the screech of the deadly creatures is sheer and shattering.

Wrists twist and the light focuses into a blade; a flick of her wrist, and arms rotate in their sockets, redirecting the light towards another skiff. It hits just perfectly so, catching and reflecting until it’s thrown again across the abyss by another tiny blade of light, redirected by a mirror. 

On and on it goes, until the monster that the Fabrikators have made is revealed: a mass of spindly limbs with mirrored parts, glinting and focusing on the light that is the bane of the Fold. Each skiff is equipped with the great arms, and each skiff, manned by Squallers and Tidemakers and Heartrenders, is placed perfectly in formation. (They are an Army, after all.)

The great creations twinkle in the wind and the light, the soft sound of metal on glass hitting hundreds of times all around them, until it truly _is_ a song. The Sunsaint cannot carry a tune, but the _oprichnik_ beside her begins to hum, and many take up the call.

_Sankta, Sankta, calling light,  
Save us from these ghastly wings,  
See it searing, burning bright  
Show them what a sunrise brings…_

She holds the light as long as she can, while the Grisha around her pick up rifles. The Unsea ripples menacingly as the shots begin to ring out, picking off one, then another, and a third. Slowly, _ever_ so slowly, the Squallers work together, moving the skiffs one grain of sand at a time out of the Shadow Fold. 

(If any _one_ of them breaks sequence, the mirror system is ruined, and the volcra will sweep in and devour them all.)

Sweat pours down General Starkov’s face, soaking into her _kefta_ and burning up in the light emanating from her skin. She does not usually maintain this level of Sun Summoning for long without exertion; with no amplifiers and no guidance, the Second Army has made the best of what it can.

And so. _Mirrors_.

It is an accident that the first blood is spilt; a blinded volcra slams into one of the delicate arms, swinging it off course. The light dies for a moment until a Healer leaps across the skiff and bodily swings himself onto the arm, tugging it back into place. When the light blooms once more, it is brighter, and there is more scarlet than there once had been.

A volcra is still in the middle of tearing out Ensign Tovalenko’s throat when Zoya Nazyalensky puts a round of hot iron through its head.

In the eye of the Unsea, there is quiet; when the singing stops, no one speaks while they slaughter these shadowy monsters, while the shadowy monsters slaughter them in return, save the occasional barked order, the occasional grunt or gasp. What they do is holy; what they do is for the good of Ravka.

_What they do is for the Sunsaint._

As the Squallers move them away from the concentration of volcra, they pick up speed. Accuracy is less important, now that they’ve lost someone. (In General Starkov’s Second Army, every life is precious.) 

She’s shaking now, arms wobbling; it’s hard to hold. 

She sways.

The first skiffs break through as her vision begins to white out at the edges. It’s not long, now; the _oprichnik_ beside her barks orders for the rest to move out of the fold, the Squallers rotating, until the light dims as each mirror system leaves its orbit.

“ _Sol Koroleva_!” someone calls. 

“ _Sankta save us_!” another cries.

The Sunsaint does not hear them. The Sunsaint does not hear anything.

Ivan catches her before she hits the deck of the skiff; she is still before the sunlight catches her hair.

**Author's Note:**

> Pls rec fics in the comments, I literally never get tired of reading them. Love me some Darklina, Nikolina, Zoyalina; Tomione and Dramione; Damerey; Sareth; and Marya/Koschei, the ultimate OTP, no I will not be taking questions. 
> 
> Is there anything you want to see with this? Should I continue? Should I try something else? Please let me know!


End file.
